This application relates to optical resonators, and more specifically, to optical whispering-gallery-mode (“WGM”) resonators.
A dielectric material may be shaped to form an optical whispering-gallery-mode (“WGM”) resonator which supports a special set of resonator modes known as whispering gallery (“WG”) modes. These modes represent optical fields confined in an interior region close to the surface of the resonator due to the total internal reflection at the boundary. Microspheres with diameters from few tens to several hundred microns have been used to form compact optical WGM resonators. Such spherical resonators include at least a portion of the sphere that comprises the sphere's equator. The resonator dimension is generally much larger than the wavelength of light so that the optical loss due to the finite curvature of the resonators is small. As a result, a high quality factor, Q, may be achieved in such resonators. Some microspheres with sub-millimeter dimensions have been demonstrated to exhibit very high quality factors for light waves, exceeding 109 for quartz microspheres. Hence, optical energy, once coupled into a whispering gallery mode, can circulate within the WGM resonator with a long photon life time.